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I always enjoy reading what Musk has to say. Insufferable nitwit interviewers at New Scientist, not so much. I am really sick of interviewers using language a

I always enjoy reading what Musk has to say. Insufferable nitwit interviewers at New Scientist, not so much. I am really sick of interviewers using language as a weapon and having hostile confrontational interviews with scientists and entrepreneurs, when the same interviewers and periodicals don't have the balls to even ask questions of the various criminals in society who are actually worthy of such contempt in an interview. In particular, the interview starts with the phrase "You claim to be...". This phrasing establishes that the subject is suspected of lying. A respectful neutral question is "You have said that..." Such language use is not unintentional. It is designed to impeach the credibility of the subject in the reader's view by painting him as someone who is dishonest and can not be trusted.

jlgreco 14y ago
That question in particular was definitely shit. I absolutely love how Musk handled it though: pointed accusatory question? Spam them with a big vocabulary and technical stuff! Textbook response, if you know that you can put the other person out of their depth.
adrianbye 14y ago
i thought both the question and answer was good, but it didn't need to be first. i don't like fluff interviews, its too easy for critical areas not to be discussed. (i do quite a few interviews myself).
larrys 14y ago
"Insufferable nitwit interviewers at New Scientist, not so much." Think that's a bit strong. I didn't take "you claim to be" as anything close to framing Musk as potentially lying. "It is designed to impeach the credibility of the subject in the reader's view" If that is the case there would have been more wording like this in the interview. I'm not seeing that in any of the other questions, at least nothing that is worthy of calling the writers at "Insufferable nitwit interviewers". Which in itself has made me think there is some general disrespect for New Scientist which I wasn't aware of. New Scientist seems to have fairly good demographics we're not talking about People Magazine here.

jlgreco 14y ago

That question in particular was definitely shit. I absolutely love how Musk handled it though: pointed accusatory question? Spam them with a big vocabulary and technical stuff! Textbook response, if you know that you can put the other person out of their depth.

adrianbye 14y ago

i thought both the question and answer was good, but it didn't need to be first. i don't like fluff interviews, its too easy for critical areas not to be discussed. (i do quite a few interviews myself).

larrys 14y ago

"Insufferable nitwit interviewers at New Scientist, not so much." Think that's a bit strong. I didn't take "you claim to be" as anything close to framing Musk as potentially lying. "It is designed to impeach the credibility of the subject in the reader's view" If that is the case there would have been more wording like this in the interview. I'm not seeing that in any of the other questions, at least nothing that is worthy of calling the writers at "Insufferable nitwit interviewers". Which in itself has made me think there is some general disrespect for New Scientist which I wasn't aware of. New Scientist seems to have fairly good demographics we're not talking about People Magazine here.